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A New Day Yesterday: UK Progressive Rock and the 1970s
An entertaining, definitive and in-depth study of prog rock, with a new cover and a foreword by Steve Hackett (Genesis).
Progressive rock, a genre formed out of a creative surge in the late Sixties and throughout the Seventies. Made by young musicians for a young audience, prog music looked towards new horizons by synthesising rock, jazz, folk, classical and other styles.
While prog has always divided critical opinion, in its heyday it had a large and devoted fanbase, and the era's biggest acts from Pink Floyd to Genesis went on to enjoy long-lasting international and commercial success. Although the scene fragmented in the late Seventies, new generations of young listeners continue to discover the unique sounds of prog today.
Examining the myths and misconceptions surrounding the genre, music journalist Mike Barnes paints a vivid, colourful picture of the Seventies based on his own interviews with the musicians, music business insiders, journalists and DJs, and the personal testimonies of fans of that extraordinary decade.
Offering something new for even the keenest of prog enthusiasts, A New Day Yesterday is an entertaining and in-depth study of both the music itself and the cultural conditions and attitudes that fed into, and were affected by, this remarkable musical phenomenon.
Progressive rock, a genre formed out of a creative surge in the late Sixties and throughout the Seventies. Made by young musicians for a young audience, prog music looked towards new horizons by synthesising rock, jazz, folk, classical and other styles.
While prog has always divided critical opinion, in its heyday it had a large and devoted fanbase, and the era's biggest acts from Pink Floyd to Genesis went on to enjoy long-lasting international and commercial success. Although the scene fragmented in the late Seventies, new generations of young listeners continue to discover the unique sounds of prog today.
Examining the myths and misconceptions surrounding the genre, music journalist Mike Barnes paints a vivid, colourful picture of the Seventies based on his own interviews with the musicians, music business insiders, journalists and DJs, and the personal testimonies of fans of that extraordinary decade.
Offering something new for even the keenest of prog enthusiasts, A New Day Yesterday is an entertaining and in-depth study of both the music itself and the cultural conditions and attitudes that fed into, and were affected by, this remarkable musical phenomenon.
936 pages, Kindle Edition
Published June 27, 2024
About the author
Mike Barnes
36 books5 followersLibrarian note:
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There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name
This profile may contain books from multiple authors of this name
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
November 24, 2025
“Cat′s foot, iron claw
Neuro-surgeons scream for more
At paranoia's poison door
Blood rack, barbed wire
Politician′s funeral pyre
Innocents raped with napalm fire
Death seed, blind man's greed
Poets starving, children bleed
Nothing he's got he really needs
21st century schizoid man”
-In the Court of the Crimson King
King Crimson, 1969
“Welcome back my friends
to the show that never ends
We're so glad you could attend
Come inside! Come inside!
There behind a glass is a real blade of grass
be careful as you pass
Move along! Move along!
Come inside, the show's about to start
guaranteed to blow your head apart
Rest assured you'll get your money's worth
The greatest show in Heaven, Hell or Earth
You've got to see the show, it's a dynamo
You've got to see the show, it's rock and roll!”
-Brain Salad Surgery
Emerson Lake & Palmer, 1973
“Early morning Manhattan,
Ocean winds blow on the land.
Movie palace is now undone,
The all night watchmen have had their fun.
Sleeping cheaply on the midnight show,
It's the same old ending - time to go!
It seems they cannot leave their dream.
There's something moving in the sidewalk steam”
-The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway
Genesis, 1974
************
For anyone who’s a fan of British progressive rock, this 2024 book traces its growth from psychedelic music in the late sixties through its heyday in the mid seventies. I was mainly interested in the headline groups, King Crimson, Emerson Lake & Palmer, Genesis and Yes, and the less strictly avant-garde bands Pink Floyd and Jethro Tull. The author Mike Barnes is a music journalist for the magazines The Wire and Mojo. He has a network of contacts with the bands and refers back to his interviews with Robert Fripp of King Crimson and Keith Emerson of ELP among others. Steve Hackett, Genesis guitarist during their golden years, wrote the introduction to this book, which covers many less known bands as well.
For each group Barnes discusses the musical careers which led up their formation and classic albums. The albums are reconsidered on their individual merits some fifty years after release and the key tours that accompanied them. Prog rock as it’s become known, also called art rock then, has gone through several changes in critical regard. Initially reviled by mainstream music writers for its pretension and overblown stage productions prog was tremendously popular for a short period of time in the early seventies, and was a response to the often vapid mainstream r&b songs of the sixties. Later on it was rejected by the punk rock movement, begun in the late seventies as a return to the rebellious roots of rock.
Being of an age to listen to the music when it was created those arguments didn’t resonate. It was a fresh sound using extended compositions and new instruments like the moog and mellotron, opening musical horizons. Jazz-rock fusion became popular during the same period, led by Miles Davis in 1969 and his constellation of like minded musicians. They went on to form their own supergroups; John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra, Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter’s Weather Report, Chick Corea and Al Dimeola’s Return to Forever and Herbie Hancock’s Headhunters. This is a very readable account, but not a definitive history as it doesn’t follow the artists after their peak periods of success.
Neuro-surgeons scream for more
At paranoia's poison door
Blood rack, barbed wire
Politician′s funeral pyre
Innocents raped with napalm fire
Death seed, blind man's greed
Poets starving, children bleed
Nothing he's got he really needs
21st century schizoid man”
-In the Court of the Crimson King
King Crimson, 1969
“Welcome back my friends
to the show that never ends
We're so glad you could attend
Come inside! Come inside!
There behind a glass is a real blade of grass
be careful as you pass
Move along! Move along!
Come inside, the show's about to start
guaranteed to blow your head apart
Rest assured you'll get your money's worth
The greatest show in Heaven, Hell or Earth
You've got to see the show, it's a dynamo
You've got to see the show, it's rock and roll!”
-Brain Salad Surgery
Emerson Lake & Palmer, 1973
“Early morning Manhattan,
Ocean winds blow on the land.
Movie palace is now undone,
The all night watchmen have had their fun.
Sleeping cheaply on the midnight show,
It's the same old ending - time to go!
It seems they cannot leave their dream.
There's something moving in the sidewalk steam”
-The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway
Genesis, 1974
************
For anyone who’s a fan of British progressive rock, this 2024 book traces its growth from psychedelic music in the late sixties through its heyday in the mid seventies. I was mainly interested in the headline groups, King Crimson, Emerson Lake & Palmer, Genesis and Yes, and the less strictly avant-garde bands Pink Floyd and Jethro Tull. The author Mike Barnes is a music journalist for the magazines The Wire and Mojo. He has a network of contacts with the bands and refers back to his interviews with Robert Fripp of King Crimson and Keith Emerson of ELP among others. Steve Hackett, Genesis guitarist during their golden years, wrote the introduction to this book, which covers many less known bands as well.
For each group Barnes discusses the musical careers which led up their formation and classic albums. The albums are reconsidered on their individual merits some fifty years after release and the key tours that accompanied them. Prog rock as it’s become known, also called art rock then, has gone through several changes in critical regard. Initially reviled by mainstream music writers for its pretension and overblown stage productions prog was tremendously popular for a short period of time in the early seventies, and was a response to the often vapid mainstream r&b songs of the sixties. Later on it was rejected by the punk rock movement, begun in the late seventies as a return to the rebellious roots of rock.
Being of an age to listen to the music when it was created those arguments didn’t resonate. It was a fresh sound using extended compositions and new instruments like the moog and mellotron, opening musical horizons. Jazz-rock fusion became popular during the same period, led by Miles Davis in 1969 and his constellation of like minded musicians. They went on to form their own supergroups; John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra, Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter’s Weather Report, Chick Corea and Al Dimeola’s Return to Forever and Herbie Hancock’s Headhunters. This is a very readable account, but not a definitive history as it doesn’t follow the artists after their peak periods of success.
Displaying 1 of 1 review